


Stone and Wine

by Morgyn Leri (morgynleri)



Series: Northern Night [2]
Category: The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Dark, GFY, Gen, Isolation, Oaths & Vows
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-07
Updated: 2015-07-07
Packaged: 2018-04-08 02:43:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,906
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4287726
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/morgynleri/pseuds/Morgyn%20Leri
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"The bargain is thus, Kíli, of the line of Durin: bend your knee to me, and do as I command you in all things, and you will have your brother. Refuse, and you will spend your days alone in the dead-stone rooms. Attempt to leave or to defy me, and I will let Azog and the uruktar have Fíli for whatever sport they desire."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Stone and Wine

Kíli doesn't know where he is when he wakes up. The room is large, and the bed is comfortable, but his head feels strange, and he's alone. Whatever he'd thought might happen after he and Fíli had been bound and forced to march with others the orcs had taken, this isn't it.

He slides off the bed - comfortable it might be, but it's tall and wide - and starts to look around. There's a fireplace with a banked bed of coals radiating a gentle heat, and arches that lead into other rooms, one of which has a locked door, the other which has a steaming pool. A chest holds tunics and trousers that are a bit too large, and a table in the room with the door has bread and cheese and a plate of cold meat already cut up. There are carpets soft under his feet, and the floor is warm, but nowhere can he find Fíli, and his head still feels strange.

The meat he pokes at and sniffs, before piling the bread and cheese on it, and retreating to the room he woke in, curling up in a corner for a moment before he grimaces, and moves to rest his back against the bed instead. Leaning against the wall made his head feel even more strange, like everything's muffled.

Once the food is gone, there's nothing to do but wait until something happens, and eventually Kíli falls asleep. He wakes up tucked back under the blankets on the bed, and this time there's a small table in the room with him. It has another plate of food - a pair of apples this time to go with another small loaf of bread - along with a pitcher and mug, and a bowl of thick stew.

The pitcher is full of something that smells fruity and sharp and a little sweet, and is a deep red when he pours it into the mug. It tastes like sour berries and honey and small beer, and Kíli makes a face, not sure if he likes it. But it's something to drink that isn't from the hot pool in the other room, and it tastes better with the stew, which is full of mushrooms and garlic and onions, with small pieces of meat that tastes like goat, and something else he can't identify.

There's still nothing to do, and no sign of Fíli, and Kíli wanders through the rooms again after he finishes eating, poking at everything. Touching the walls has the same sort of effect now as it did earlier, only now it makes his hands feel numb, and he doesn't like it. There is no music to the stone like he's used to, not even in the little bathing pool itself, and Kíli retreats to sit on the bed, where he at least doesn't have to touch any of the dead-feeling stone.

How long he's there before he falls asleep again, he doesn't know. Without the stone to sing to him, and no sunlight, he has no manner of marking the passage of time.

Food and drink are waiting again when he wakes up, and the fire is built up, so maybe it's daytime, or maybe the orcs - or whoever they took him to - just want him to think that. Kíli pokes at the food, but doesn't take any, wandering around the rooms again, hoping that maybe he just missed something.

His days begin to take on a routine from there, though it's a slightly more desperate one each time. Sleep, wake to food, make a futile circuit of the rooms, sometimes decide to bathe, and maybe wrap himself up in the clothes that don't fit him. His own clothes vanish one time, and are never returned. The food is always the same sort of stuff. One meal of cold meat, bread, and cheese or butter, usually without refilling the pitcher, another of fruit, bread, and stew, with the same wine in the pitcher.

It's a surprise when the routine breaks, and there's someone else in the room when he wakes. It's another dwarf, but not Fíli. Someone shorter, with hair as black as Uncle Thorin's, waiting at the table which is empty of food this time.

"Who are you?" The question escapes before Kíli can even think, and he frowns, adding, "Where am I? What do you want? Where is Fíli?"

"Your brother is elsewhere. I'm just here to take you to Mistress when you wake." The dwarf doesn't share a name, and Kíli doesn't bother to tell nem his own name. Either ne knows it, or ne don't care. Or both, maybe.

"Why?"

"Because she wants to speak to you." The dwarf shrugs, and stands up. "Once you're dressed, I'll take you to her."

Kíli scrambles to get out of bed, dragging on clean clothes as quickly as he can, following the other dwarf from the rooms to a tunnel that didn't feel as dead, and from there to a larger corridor where there were a handful of others - mostly orcs, though they didn't move from where they leaned against walls next to doors, as if guarding them. They didn't even seem to pay more attention to Kíli and the other dwarves than it took to note they existed.

At one door, the orc guard did pay more attention, but it was one they were allowed through, beyond which was another corridor, this one empty and silent, with only a few doors opening from it. The one at the end opens into a room with a massive balcony, sunlight streaming in past the columns that line it. There doesn't seem to be anyone in the room, though after a moment, a tall person steps in from the balcony, features invisible with the sun behind nem.

"Have the accommodations been to your satisfaction, Kíli?" The voice is light, almost musical, with an accent that Kíli doesn't recognize.

"Where is Fíli?" He doesn't care about whatever questions the person has, he just wants to know where his brother is. Even if he's probably being rude, and he can almost hear Balin's sigh about his manners. "I want my brother."

The person - the Mistress the other dwarf spoke of, probably - chuckles, moving away from the balcony to a small table on one side of the room with a pitcher and a pair of goblets. Kíli has to blink away the sun-dazzle to focus on her. Black hair in three braids, a robe that's a deep red belted at her waist, both a sharp contrast to unnaturally pale skin.

"Safe, and elsewhere." She pours a dark red liquid into the two goblets, a hint of the same sweet-sharp smell of the wine left in his room reaching Kíli's nose. "Have a drink, and sit. Talk with me. You may have a chance to see your brother later."

Kíli looks back at the door he came through, wondering if he could find Fíli if he could escape. But there are orcs out there, and he doesn't have anything to fight them with. Turning back, he sees the woman is watching him, waiting at the table with one goblet in her hand, the other sitting in front of an empty chair.

"Sit." She waves a hand to the empty chair, waiting for him to obey her, watching him the entire time, her grey eyes reminding him of summer storms, dark and dangerous.

"What do you want?" Kíli ignores the goblet once he's sitting, not really interested in more wine, not if he might find out where Fíli is, or get to see him.

The woman smiles, taking a sip of her own wine, but doesn't answer immediately. Meeting his gaze, and holding his stare until Kíli looks away, before she says, "Taste your wine, Kíli, and I will tell you how you may see your brother again."

Glaring at her, Kíli picks up the goblet, taking a quick mouthful of the wine, and setting it down again while he swallowed.

Chuckling, the woman sips from her goblet again. "The bargain is thus, Kíli, of the line of Durin: bend your knee to me, and do as I command you in all things, and you will have your brother. Refuse, and you will spend your days alone in the dead-stone rooms. Attempt to leave or to defy me, and I will let Azog and the uruktar have Fíli for whatever sport they desire."

His breath leaves him in a rush, and Kíli stares at her. He doesn't know who Azog is, or what uruktar are, but if they are orcs like those who took him and Fíli captive, he can only imagine what they might do. Like in the stories Mr. Dwalin had told them until Uncle Thorin had told him to stop.

"Uncle will rescue us." Kíli bites his lip, though he hopes it's true. Uncle Thorin is probably looking right now, and planning on how to find them and get them home.

"If he can find anyone to believe him that you are not dead." She shrugs. "I can have Gunnr take you back to your rooms if you do not wish to take the offer."

"No!" Kíli shakes his head, glancing at the other dwarf to make sure ne hadn't moved closer. "I don't want to go back. I want Fíli."

The woman raises an eyebrow, the movement pulling at the swirls and spikes of black under her skin. Waiting for something more, and Kíli swallows, sliding off the chair. The stone is cold under his knees, but it sings, and he takes comfort in the living stone as he meets the gray gaze of his new liege.

His voice is shaky as he tries to remember the words that Balin had been teaching him and Fíli as the oath of fealty. They've all fled his mind, and all he can think of is to repeat some of what the woman had told him. "I Kíli, will obey you in all things, from now until my lord release me or death take me."

It is a simple oath, but it is as sincere as he can make it. He wants Fíli back.

Her hand is warmer than he expects, and gentle on his head. "I hear you, Kíli, of the line of Durin, sister-son of Thorin, son of Thráin, son of Thror, and accept your oath in the spirit it was given. Obedience rewarded with loyalty, defiance with desolation." She pauses for a long moment before looking past him to Gunnr. "Show Kíli to his new room. His brother will be sent after him in good time."

Kíli's new room is along the same corridor as the room with the balcony, and he listens to the door lock behind Gunnr before he goes to explore. There are two bedrooms, and a deep bathing pool in a room that connects them, but otherwise, it seems little different from the other ones. The furnishings a little richer, perhaps, and the walls don't leave his hands or head numb, but much the same.

How long he waits, he doesn't know, but he barely keeps himself from bolting when the door is unlocked once more, and opened enough for Fíli to be ushered inside. Kíli throws himself at his brother as soon as the door shuts again, clinging to him and pressing his forehead against Fíli's. Whatever happens next, he has his brother back.


End file.
